Why I'm Here

My grandmother has been in the hospital for four weeks and I've been helping my mom take care of her for almost two weeks now. The kids each had classroom parties this week, and I was responsible for quite a few things for each party. We didn't even get to make it to Abigail's party, so I had to make sure I took care of the food platters before we left town in a rush. We left so quickly that I forgot to let the childcare coordinator know I wouldn't be there for nursery duty Wednesday night, so I had to give big apologies when I got the phone call from her that night. I've still been working full time while sitting at the hospital. My phone broke yesterday, and it was a pain to get Sprint to fix it. That was really stressing me out to be so disconnected.

I could go on and on with everything that is occupying my time as well as my mind lately.

Yet... A song in the Good Friday church service tonight reminded that this busyness, these responsibilties and even the caretaking of my grandmother is not my life's purpose. I hate that I have to be reminded, but am so thankful that I was reminded.

Here I am to worship. Here I am to bow down. Here I am to say that You're my God.

Out With the Old, In With the New

What better way to lead into the Resurrection weekend than to plant new life?! The kids and I spend Thursday evening replacing the fall/winter pansies throughout the front yard flower beds. It was refreshing to get rid of the color-drained winter blooms and replace them with vibrant new life. 

See what I mean?

Those wilting and dieing pansies are gone. In their place are bright red salvia... 

and white-as-snow petunias 

and golden yellow African marigolds. 

Abigail picked out these marigolds, much to my dismay, but seeing and hearing her delight after they were in the ground made it worthwhile. 

And, hearing the compliments of numerous neighbors tell us our yard is the prettiest in the neighborhood is always nice. I wish I had taken the time to explain the significance of our time of planting. So, I'm taking the time to tell you. We delight in the new life God has given us through his death for us on the cross, and these flowers bring new life to our yard and brighten our home, or at least what the neighbors see of our home. I hope people also see the way God has brightened our own lives with the new life he's given us. 

Resurrection Eggs

I mentioned these on Sunday and wanted to devote a full blog posting for anyone who isn't familiar with Resurrection Eggs. My mother-in-law introduced them to us last year, and I finally decided that this was a way we could not avoid the Easter egg craze, but embrace it in a way that's true to our faith so I picked up my own set. 

Don't get too excited, those plastic eggs aren't full of Easter candy. 

Each egg holds a token or symbol of a different part of the precious Easter story. For example, one egg holds a piece of purple cloth to represent the robe put on Jesus to mock him for being King of the Jews and the accompanying scripture is Matthew 27:28. 

Now, I have to admit that I hesitated to bring Easter eggs into our house because I see them as a worldly intrusion into our faith as the egg comes a pagan symbol of fertility from rite-of-spring passages celebrated by Romans, Gauls, Chinese, Egyptians and Persians. Christians have attempted to put another spin on the eggs, but I'm just not buying it. We've been able to avoid Easter eggs up until this year, and I finally decided that we would have to find a way to work the truth into our culture. Hence, the Resurrection Eggs. 

Next year I'll start the tradition 12 days before Easter and lead up to the day with an egg and devotional each day. This year, we're doing a couple eggs a day until we finish on Easter since I didn't start until Tuesday. We're going through the eggs over breakfast each day and discussing the scripture passage and what it means. 

If you're interested, you can pick up Resurrection Eggs at Mardel's, Family Christian or LifeWay or even Wal-Mart for about $10. Or, make your own set with these directions  http://www.rainbowcastle.org/resurrectioneggs.html.

The People Waved Palm Branches & Shouted "Hallelujah"...

We spent this Palm Sunday morning in church and were so blessed! The band was in full force with a full brass section, baby grand piano on stage and full percussion section. It's amazing what they add to the worship, and it was so moving to sing "He Is a Mighty God" with the full force of the band and the power of so many believers imagining what it was like on that Palm Sunday as Jesus triumphantly entered into the city. 

One woman was so moved to baptism that she insisted that she be baptized at the end of the service, and the pastor was happy to oblige. One thing we've loved about this church is that the pastor has obviously allowed God to move in the services. This wasn't the first time we've seen the service plan change as God's spirit moves, and it's awesome to be a part of that. I took the chance to get Abigail out of her class and take her in for the baptism so that we could have a talk about what it was and the decision the woman was making. Ab's still a bit too young to fully comprehend the decision, but I know we're planting seeds in her mind and heart. And, going into this Easter week, we'll be talking about it all week. 

I've been contemplating activities I can do with the kids this week to further impress upon them the meaning of Easter and would gladly welcome any ideas you have that your family does. Tonight, we watched the Veggie Tales An Easter Carol DVD. I was a bit disappointed in it, but it was an okay version of the story. There was still too much emphasis on eggs and not enough on Christ. 

Have you ever used the Resurrection Eggs to teach your kids? My mother-in-law went through them with Abigail last year, and I think they're a great teaching tool, so I picked up a set that I'll use this week. (I'll blog about them later in the week in case you don't know what they are.) 

We'll also have a few church services this week, and I'm eagerly looking forward to them. I wish Easter was as celebrated as the Christmas season, as we have so many traditions and customs to recognize Christ's birth, but not near enough ways we recognize His death and resurrection. I want our family to be different than that. I want to teach the kids the true meaning of Easter and have a week of rejoicing and praising God for what He did for us through His son. 

I have no photos to share, but thought I'd stop in a few moments and update this. We're having an amazing weekend here at the Hardy house and hope your family is doing the same. After I was off work last week, Daniel has nine days off that started on Monday so we've had quite a bit of family time recently, and it's been a blast. 

Today we all worked in the yard together. Well, it was a beautiful day, so there was a little bit of working and a lot of playing. And, tonight we cooked up a yummy brinner of waffles, scrambled eggs and sausage before watching Bedtime Stories together. I was leery of an Adam Sandler children's movie, but this was great for the kids and fun to watch. 

We've also had some amazing happenings going on this week that I won't elaborate on, but want to praise God publicly for the blessings we've received. We've recently made some changes in our family life and the way we manage things, and are seeing God honoring His promises of taking care of us after these changes. Even though we know in our heads that God has us in His hands, it is surprisingly still amazing to see Him work in our lives when we are obedient to Him. With the Easter week upon us, this is a great time to step back and see God working in our lives. How are you seeing Him in your life? I hope you've taken the time to thank Him and praise Him for all He's doing. Too many times, what comes out of our mouths, minds and hearts are the worries and complaints we have. Please take some time tonight and this week to bring glory to God. I know He's working in your life as much as He is ours. Feel free to leave comments of praises you want to share!!!

Must See

I've already blogged today, and this doesn't accomplish anything in getting me caught up on my blogging. But, I can not neglect sharing this with everyone I know. Please take a few minutes to watch this. If you're not moved, I think your heart needs something, or rather, Someone.

I haven't really been in a blogging mood the past week, so I apologize if anyone has been looking for updates or pics of my cute kids or something crafty. Things are just busy with work and my volunteer position at Abigail's school so blogging is the first thing to take a back seat. 

But, I do want to share one brief thought with you. Isn't life great?! It's nothing in particular, but the sum of it all. I've been blessed beyond my wildest imagination, and I can't tell you how many times the thought has occurred to me in the past week that my life is awesome. I hope the same overwhelming feeling is shared by you sometime this week. Just sit and look at what and who you have and how great your life is. God is so good to all of us!

We Pulled the Plug

I mentioned this earlier in the week, and failed to have the time to write about it yesterday. But, we are now in our second day of observing Lent. For many Christians, I think the Lenten season is foreign and unfamiliar, so I'll give you my brief understanding of the observance.

The season of Lent is a symbolic time meant to represent Jesus' withdrawal into the wilderness for 40 days before his crucifixion. It originated as a time of preparation for Easter. I've read that it was a time when the faithful rededicated themselves and converts were taught the faith and prepared for baptism, which was only performed during the Easter season. It is now traditionally considered a time of soul-searching and repentance and reflection. Because Lent was begun by the ancient church, it is traditionally only observed by Presbyterian, Methodist, Lutheran, Anglican, Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox churches.

The time of Lent has several parts which are fasting, prayer and repentance. Like myself, you're probably more familiar with the fasting aspect. Originally, Lent participants abstained from all animal byproducts (meat, eggs, milk, etc.) throughout the 40 days (Sundays are not included as they are a time of celebration and relaxed from the guidelines of Lent), and only one meal per day was allowed. Although those conditions were quite strict, our Western culture requires only no meat on Fridays, Ash Wednesday and Good Friday. Also, fasting on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday is observed, which means only one meal on each of those days.

You may have seen many people yesterday, Ash Wednesday, with the black marks of ash on their foreheads. That means they attended a mass or service in observance of Ash Wednesday. The ashes are made from the burning of the previous Easter's blessed palms and are a symbol of our mortality (Then the Lord God formed man out of he dust of the ground...-Gen 2:7). The ashes on the head is an Old Testament custom seen in the books of Esther, Job and Jonah and is a symbol of penance and sorrow for our sins. The most interesting part (to me) of the Ash Wednesday observance is the final reading from Joel 2:18 (Rend your hearts, and not your garments). It defines to me the motivation the Lenten season. I am spending a time solely giving my heart (i.e. time, energy, efforts) and not my outward acts (Bible studies, home groups, church functions) to God.

Although I have observed aspects of Lent a few times previously, we have never observed it together as a family. However, we have approached Easter differently than we grew up. We don't participate in egg hunts or make mention of the Easter bunny. I'm quite ashamed at what our secular culture has made of the Easter season and that our churches and Christians have glommed onto those secular views. Somehow plastic eggs and chocolate bunnies don't exactly tie into my Savior bleeding and dieing for me on a cross, and I don't want to teach that lie to my children. 

The brief reason the modern church does not observe Lent dates back to the 16th century when Calvinists discarded all Christian holy days on the basis that they were Roman innovations. It is also easy to understand that as a Christian, my participation in Lent is not required of me by God because of Easter. His sacrifice on the cross freed us from the law, and we are not working or striving to get to heaven. I know that my belief in Christ Jesus and love for him and life of following him is leading me to eternal life in heaven with him.

I have mainly thought in the past that the Lenten season was a pointless outwardly act, which I'm sure it can be to many. However, as with any act within a relationship, the motivation is self-determined and can not be judged by man, only by God. I am excited at the prospects we have within our own home during this time to draw us closer to each other as we draw closer to God and re-focus our relationship and work to get further from apathy towards God. We've chosen to fast from cable TV because it is, on many levels, something that separates us from our relationship with God. It fills our minds with many subjects that are not edifying and takes away our time that would be better spent in prayer and with each other. We are excited at the idea of having time to read (I've just started reading Captivated.), go to bed earlier, have family devotionals, prayer time and, essentially, be more quiet, less distracted and more focused on what God wants to show us during this time. 

We had been discussing and debating whether this was the right step and whether our motivations were in the right place when I heard a song Sunday morning on the way to church, we then sang it in the worship service and then heard it again on the way home from church. The line "I Will Rise" repeats many times in the song, and my less than deep thoughts kept telling me that God is calling me to rise up and I can't rise up if I'm sitting on my rear end in front of the TV.  

Lent - Questions & Teaser

Does anyone reading this celebrate Lent? If not, then why? I grew up with many Catholic friends and have always been impressed with the energy and consistency put forth into the Catholic traditions. Although I've never been a member of a church that participated in the Lenten season, I've written quite a few articles on the subject and conducted several interviews with ministers leading Lenten services.  This has culminated in me following Lent a few times in the last decade, and we will be doing so as a family this year. 

I'm working on a blog entry for Ash Wednesday and wanted to find out first if anyone else is planning to observe this 40-day season leading into Easter? If not, do you have any other traditions that lead into Easter other than the day of Easter?

Please share...

Does It Matter?

I'm pondering the question these days and am now asking you, does it matter who gets elected? Don't get me wrong. I'll still vote. (In fact, this will be my first time to actually vote in a voting booth. I have never voted anything but absentee by mail, since I maintained my Texas residency/voter registration, but didn't live in Texas. I'm a bit nervous and don't want to look like a bafoon, but will be at the polls with bells on.) 

But, I can't help but wonder if it really matters. Over the course of the last week or two, I've watched George Bush exercise a wide (or in my opinion, illegal) range of his Constitutional powers and push for spending that I never thought he was capable of supporting, much less instigating. (Oh, how I wish I was in a Conn Law class now instead of 10 years ago.) It makes me wish the George Bush I voted for in 2000 was the one currently at the helm. He's just not the same politician these days. Does Washington do that to all of them? 

  

Will it matter who gets elected? I've decided it won't matter. Whomever Sen. Obama or Sen. McCain says they are now, I don't think either one will be a spittin' image of that person in eight years, or even four, from now. 

So, I'm sticking with putting God at the helm. As Rich Mullins sings, "You have been king of my glory. Won't you be my Prince of Peace." Instead of putting my faith in the hands of politicians in this time of "crisis," I'm choosing to live in peace and not worry, fret or debate over what the right course of action is, whether the issue is financial or presidential. Isn't that what all the hippies have been saying for years? Peace, man.